Photos via VetPronto.
Photos via VetPronto.

There’s an Uber for moving, an Uber for fitness, an Uber for pot — and now, there’s an Uber for sick pets.

VetPronto recently launched in Seattle, offering an on-demand pet health service for those that prefer to push a few buttons to have a veterinarian come to their house, rather than the other way around.

“We were talking to a bunch of pet owners about the challenges around veterinary care and they pretty much unanimously told us that getting to the vet was a major pain,” said co-founder Joe Waltman. “We made the rather obvious realization that an opportunity might exist to provide a great house call service.”

Joe Waltman.
Joe Waltman.

VetPronto has a team of five veterinarians who offer traditional exams for $129. There’s also additional packages that pet owners can choose, like vaccines or special health tests.

Customers can access VetPronto’s mobile app to view availability and make appointments, while vets can use their smartphone to access pet info and create medical records.

Waltman said that his startup has learned a whole lot in the past few months, from what services to offer to how to follow up with clients.

“One surprising lesson was that there actually wasn’t much demand for free veterinary services,” he noted. “We suspect this is due to the fact that pet owners associate quality with price and want what is best for their loved ones.”

The most common appointment is the $129 annual check-up, but VetPronto is also seeing many requests for vaccinations and blood tests. The company is serving “several dozen” customers per week.

“Our customers tend to be very proactive when it comes to the health of their pets,” Waltman said.

There are other mobile veterinary services available in Seattle, but Waltman said that his main competition comes from the traditional brick-and-mortar clinic. He noted several advantages of VetPronto, including flexible scheduling, no stressful waiting rooms, avoiding potential infections at a clinic, and “clear and transparent pricing.”

The startup, which is bootstrapped and employs three full-timers, plans to expand to San Francisco and Los Angeles soon.

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